Hindsight
by Titanic-fanatic
Summary: "I often wonder if it is all worth it" Mikasa divulged, breaking him from his reverie. "If you love him. It will always be worth it" Levi replied, voice low and filled with bitter honesty. After the 57th exp. she goes to thank him for saving her/Eren but ends up learning from the man she hates. Slight rivamika but so slight it's like a shadow in the distance. May continue if wanted


Hindsight

"Heichou, forgive the intrusion, Hange said I would find you here"

She had greeted his silhouette quietly as not to disrupt the silent air irreparably. It was odd to see the dining hall as such, so hollow and empty. In a way its sombre serenity was comforting as it offered a pocket of soundlessness in a loud and deafening world. It hit her as soon as she tread on the flagstones, and entered its domain, along with his presence. Both required a tentative tone, existing in tandem and bathed in a warm amber glow of firelight. The man, sat before the large hearth, seemed to be in deep concentration. It was an occurrence she had learnt not to interrupt without just cause, often receiving a sharp and flippant dismissal that defined his callous demeanour, but thought the resolution to come and seek him out this evening was adequate enough. It had been a laboured decision, proving its mettle as she dithered before opening the door and speaking.

Levi turned from the fireplace, elbows still hitched on his knees and fingers still pressed together. He had hardly moved save the cocking of his head. The Captain sent and an unreadable look in her vague direction before retreating it back to the flames. Focus resumed he rested his chin and lips dubiously on his digits with a sigh "What is it, Ackerman?"

Mikasa swallowed what she believed was her pride masquerading as anxiety. It wasn't clear to her. Not any more. So much was blurred today it was difficult to decipher anything without a degree of doubt, even her own thoughts.

"I wanted to thank you. For saving Eren today" she pressed on, unfazed by his apathetic tone.

There was a crackle of wood succumbing to heat before Levi decided to reply.

"It is my duty brat. I have been charged with his protection or did you miss the hearing?" he flung his stony eyes to the girl again, this time as nonchalantly as his tone inferred and allowing them to slip over her stance. Mikasa wasn't looming unabashedly as he suspected, nor was there any fire in her black eyes, save that of the fire reflecting coldly in them. Perplexed, he paused, lips pursing with an attempt to stir the unnervingly dead coal stare "However, I do recall a brat glaring at me and thinking if I was unfortunate enough for a blade to be at her disposal, it would firmly rammed into my skull before I could blink"

Her eyes thinned in response.

"Or am I mistaking you for someone else?" he offers dryly.

It took a moment for Mikasa to falter under the Corporal's impassive gaze, she fought it but she was tired; physically and mentally drained and not able to put up a hard front as usual. She retreated into her red scarf a little, awkwardly touching it as her arm crossed her front and latched onto the other.

"I wanted to thank you for saving him _from_ me" Mikasa elaborated, voice losing what little tenacity it had.

She sensed her superior shift, her eyes having evaded his of their own accord. Levi lifted an eyebrow, dropping his hands between his bent legs and resettling his arms on them. The girl seemed pained, a tension tugging at her forehead as she did the same to the red fabric dangling from her neck. He didn't regret his curt words but his intrigue had been stoked, along with the large black eyes peering over the rim of her scarf. They were retreating and soft, more open than usual despite her lids hooding them protectively.

"Sit, you look as troubled as I feel" he responded.

Levi watched her walk over, a little hesitant. Understandably so, this was probably the only civil words they had exchanged, save earlier in the woods. These instances used the words civil loosely as it was and right now was alien. In battle was a circumstance they were both accustomed to; it held urgency and purpose under any conversation. Right now they were alone and for once Mikasa wasn't pissed off at him, at least outwardly judging by the response to his remark. His silver stare studied her as a welcome distraction from his own contemplation. She eyed him wearily in return, placing herself a foot or so away before the flames.

He leant forward as she sat, grabbing the iron poker and disrupted the fire inciting a bit more vivacity in it. The tense aura she was emanating dissipated as a fresh peel of warmth unfurled, he felt it dissolve under the scent of charcoal and in her defeated exhale. Falling back into his seat Levi let a leg drop to the ground, taking up something in his grasp as he did so. His bare feet clenched at the rug they were on, supplementing the pain that could not formulate in his face at its touch.

"I am overbearing" Mikasa stated, gaze occupied with the fire. The metal clinking on the floor didn't deter her absorbed eyes, nor did her Captain's movements. It felt like an admission, an epiphany she wished wasn't true.

"There are worse things to be" he noted, words weighted with some meaning that Mikasa did not understand. It was at this Mikasa tore her eyes away, only to see Levi was equally consumed by the mandarin and scarlet light. It danced in his reflective gaze as she eyed the symbol of their cause in his hand, ripped from a soldier's uniform no less. The memory of the day pressed on her heart, along with a guilt. It could have been worse. It had been for him. She had only lost Eren to regain him a few moments later. The man who had helped her to do so had lost everything, never to see it again. What was he left with? A patch of fabric and interrupted solitude.

"I'm sorry for your loss Levi Heichou" she offered sincerely, as though apologising for her presence along with her sentiment.

His reserved expression didn't waver, merely focusing a little more purposefully on the light before them. It fell on his grey shirt and trousers as softly as his face. Despite it being filled with hard and sharp features the fire illuminated a fragility to Mikasa, one she had not witnessed prior. His eyes were not his own, the lines around them weary with fatigue and their attention fixated on a place elsewhere.

"Petra-san..." Mikasa found herself saying before she could stop herself "Apologies Heichou, it's just I heard her father on our return" she rambled, causing herself more discomfort and stifling the calm air.

The response she got was unexpected; a smile tugging in the smallest of ways at the corner of Levi's mouth. It was sad, and so could not retain its form for more than a few seconds, slackening with a flash of teeth and absorbed by a thoughtful expression. It lulled, along with turbulent grey eyes, to the patch of cloth between his fingers. Mikasa watched, uncertain. She wasn't one to feel empathy, or anything unless it was in regards to Eren, but right now she was grieved for the Lance Corporal beside her; a man she normally despised. It didn't surface but it thrummed in her heart clumsily. Perhaps it was the polite way he had allowed her in or that she was emotionally beaten but in the crimson wake of the flames he appeared human. Formality and iciness had thawed, his countenance remained devoid of whatever he was truly feeling in that moment but the vulnerable parting of his lips, the way they had not fully shut, spoke volumes.

"What the mind does not know, the heart cannot grieve Ackerman" he answers levelly, turning over the token as he meets the girl's gaze "and stop apologising, it is unlike you"

He meets a stoic expression framed with ebony hair. It is hard to read, showing no signs of the fear or melancholy that intercepted her words. Levi wonders if this is what people saw when they described his own reticence. Bizarrely, it was better than being faced with empathy or condolence in his mind. It made him feel like he wasn't alone in his behaviours; that he wasn't some unfeeling bastard and could be branded as some sort of normal in burying his emotions so deep that they have difficulty to thrive and breathe.

"I think I need to take heed of that Heichou" she says after a moment under his inspection. Her heart stammers unevenly as a reminder of why.

Levi's brow furrows, sure steel settling on her face "You know that Eren refuses to admit it to himself, there _is_ a difference" he indicates.

Mikasa felt like he had just blown an untrustworthy wind into her dilapidated sails. Why would he breathe false hope to where there was nothing but a defeated sigh? Then again what motive did he have in lying? If there was someone whose word she should trust, be it from a barbed mouth with a tendency for inflicting anguish, it was Levi Heichou's. After all, whenever he had been curt to her it was in response to her own offhandedness and lack of respect that she so effortlessly doled out to him. Conflicted Mikasa fiddled with the end of her scarf, the fabric pooled in her lap. Needless to say this action or her musing did not aid the turmoil in her gut.

"Do you think she knew?" she replies casually, this time without fear of overstepping her mark. This wasn't an issue where Eren was concerned but this was different, just as Levi had said. Yes, this was really none of her business but he was being frank with her in his opinions, and she suspected he was expecting such words back. Wouldn't want to let his impression of her down fully, would she?

Watching her, Levi pressed his fingers a bit tighter on Petra's patch, feeling each stitch against his skin. Summoning a courage from within he spoke, it sounded just as nonchalant as always but by god it was hard to unearth something that had been driven so deep into his heart. He wouldn't have done so, but despite her forwardness Ackerman had a way about her. This evening she wasn't looking for a fight with it and appeared to be speaking from a similar place as he. Perhaps it was how catatonic she could be. Levi felt like he was speaking with himself. A younger and more naive version of himself, but himself none the less "I did not refuse to acknowledge my feelings. I just refused to act upon them" Levi rationalised, a little evasively but that couldn't be helped. He wasn't going to pour his heart out to some brat, no matter how similar they were.

"Where does that leave you then?" she posed, having held his words in those elusive onyx eyes for a minute or so.

He shrugged his shoulders, mind now filled with another type of fire. Copper flickered through his thoughts, illuminated by gold. It ensnared his senses for a second, replacing the sensation of stitches in his grasp. Silk. Cold.

He blinked, as though tempering the recollection "Filled with regret and thanks" Levi noted his erratically pulsing heart, wishing to quell it before it became too strong and too present "I maintain that what I said. You can only miss what you had. If I had everything I had wanted I probably wouldn't have stopped you from killing the female titan but assisted you..."

Levi paused at his own conclusion, he'd arrived at it hours ago but it still seared through his veins uneasily. Logic interceded and cooled the heat but did not remove the sting "We would all be dead, along with most of the troops, so would they...Eren included...but I would have had her"

The man debates this on his tongue. It was something he had not voiced but had been considering ever since he had seen her crumpled body on the ground. He would have had her. In every which way he humanly could. They were set for it, belonged to one another, yet she had broken the promise. He didn't have her anymore, not that he'd laid a finger on her more than a tentative stolen kiss, yet she still had a suffocatingly wondrous hold on him. Petra was always stubborn, more than he believe it or not.

"I often wonder if it is all worth it" Mikasa divulged, breaking him from his reverie.

"If you love him. It will always be worth it" Levi replied, voice low and filled with bitter honesty.

At this the short man rose, hands and patch of fabric thrust into his pockets. He waited, looking at the door and sensing the girl's wide eyes encompassing him. Nobody had so bluntly confronted her about her feelings for Yeager; that was what her fractured expression told him when he met it. She had never looked so innocent, so young, so inexperienced with the ways of the world. By the gods it reminded him of her. He remained like this allowing the lull in conversation to take his seat, dropping his grey eyes to his spot with a sigh.

"Hindsight is a cruel thing Ackerman, especially to the strongest. We have to endure it most" Levi returns flatly, casting Mikasa cryptically closed gaze before placing a hand on her head gently and departing.

She sat there, confused and simultaneously enlightened. How had just read her so thoroughly? Mikasa continued fumbling with her scarf, lost in her musings of Eren and the image of Humanity's strongest leaving the room. They mingled with his words, measuring her heartbeat to a pace of understanding. She felt her crown at the place where he had, eyes set on the fire. It was as though her burden had been lightened but guilt was pulling down on her once again. She simply wanted to thank the man but had inadvertently plagued him with her own issues. He didn't need to hear that, given what happened today.

Mikasa pondered the receding back of the Lance Corporal, lips set in thought. A newfound respect had planted itself within at his kindness; even though he was clearly going through hell he still had given his time to another, more than she deserved for the way she treated him. Not only that but the echo of his touch left no doubt in her heart that he'd lessened her burden by the contact, mounting it onto his own without any hesitancy.

He was right, hindsight was cruel.

If this is what it tasted like Mikasa knew she had to become stronger; one man who carried the weight of the world could not endure it forever. The least she could do was carry her own.


End file.
